


Cowboy Take Me Away

by BubuBORG



Series: Team Medi: Resurgence [5]
Category: SilverHawks, Star Trek: Picard
Genre: Fenris Rangers, Freecloud, Gen, Star Trek: Picard - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-02-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:35:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22840351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BubuBORG/pseuds/BubuBORG
Summary: Joy Reid Gamling is on Freecloud for business, not pleasure, thank you very much, but regardless bumps into an unexpected face.
Relationships: Gamling (Tolkien)/Original Female Character(s)
Series: Team Medi: Resurgence [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1618627
Kudos: 2





	Cowboy Take Me Away

All in all, Joy Gamling liked the orignal Starship Casino better.

Then again, that was almost forty years ago, and under slightly (but not by much) more shady management. 

But work brought her to Freecloud on a semi-regular basis, and as long as she stuck to her spending limit, she stayed out of trouble. 

The mechs were serviced on a rigorous schedule, especially in the last few years.Joy was lucky to avoid the burn the incident on Mars had incurred on a lot of her peers in the cybernetics field. 

Still, she felt like a Judas every time she had to correct that her work was on Mechs, and not Synthetics. 

Her robot boys, bereft of all but the simplest AI, were toys after all.

Especially the rock-em, sock-em kind that brought her to Freecloud.

After checking out their prize fighter, the newest version of the venerable “Smiley”, she made her way, into the newest incarnation of her old favorite casino.

Unlike the antique saucer section-turned-space-station-turned casino, the newest Starship Casino was wholly terrestrial, with a holographic marquis of the old classic logo, with playing-card imagery dancing here and there.

It was garish.

It was tacky.

It was, Joy thought, _perfect_.

She walked in, as holographic greeters attempted to inundate her with deals and free chips.

She was having none of it.she tapped on her wrist device and the holos turned away from her.

She looked around, and noticed the carpet on the floor, almost an exact recreation of the original.She never thought she’d see the day when life in Limbo, thirty-six years ago, would turn into nostalgia.

“Welcome to the…”

A diminutive alien walked up to her, his arms wide.“Joy?Joy Reid?!” he exclaimed.

Her eyes widened.“Har—Hardware?!” she replied back.She took a knee and wrapped her arms around him.“And actually, it’s Joy Gamling now.A while now, actually.”

“Oh, heh-heh.It’s Ruka these days myself.Ruka Vinata, co-owner of the Starship Casino.”

“Wow!” She got up and looked around.“That explains a lot of the detail around here.You really made the place look the old one.”

“Lots of people remember the old Starship Casino,” Ruka said with a shrug.“They forget the racketeering and money laundering that the Mob was doing there, of course, so everything else gets romanticized.Go figure.He paused and glanced up at her.Joy still had an exuberance of youth about her, despite her graying hair and lined features. 

Still had a sparkle in her eye, he thought.

“So, what game do you fancy?” he asked her.

“Ahh, I’m all gamed out,” She said, waving a hand in the air.“I’m only on Freecloud for my usual mech maintenance checks.You’re not on my list, so…no mechs?”

Ruka’s face darkened.“No.Not anymore.”

The two made their way into one of the side lounges.It was dimly lit, and sparsely populated.A few were playing casual tabletop games, the holograms bathing them in pale light in the darkness. An amiable bartender looked up.“What’ll the lady have, boss?”

He looked to her, who shrugged.“On the house?” he offered.

She smiled, and looked to the bartender.“Samarian Sunset?”

He nodded.“Traditional, or Style Neue?”

“Traditional.”

She sat down on the stool, and looked over her shoulder at Ruka who shook his head.“Gotta keep on my rounds.The other boys might be along if you stick around long enough.Good seein’ you, Joy.”

The bartender ignored the exchange as he continued with his work constructing the drink for Joy.At the end he presented a glass of clear, un-iced liquid to her.“You ready?” he asked.

She nodded.“Do it.”

He flicked at the edge of the glass, and a resounding ping sound rang out.As he did, orange and red colors bloomed throughout the glass. 

A gentleman on her left was working on his own drink and seemed to ignore her.He had a scruffy beard, and a slight mop of unkempt curly hair. 

She spied him steal a slight glance as she sipped demurely at the glass and took out her data stick, going over her itinerary checklist. 

“Here for business?” he remarked.“On Freecloud?”

“Yeah,” she sighed.“Those mechs don’t repair themselves over at the Coliseum.”She added, “And if they could, they can’t anymore.”

He turned to look at her.His brow was furrowed, and his eyes were shot with red. _Either he’s on the snakeweed_ , she thought, _or a little bit of the Old Toby_. 

“I…I don’t mean to sound forward or creepy but…did he say you were Joy?You _are_ Joy Gamling, aren’t you?”

She held out her hand.“That’s me.You know, you look…”

Joy’s blood froze. 

“…familiar.My God.”

“I think we met at the McGucket Foundation Excellence awards, but that was at least thirty years ago,” he murmured, his voice slightly slurred.

“That was several years and Excellence awards ago,” Joy said.“You were the emcee that year.But…nobody’s seen you for like ever.Doctor Maddox…!”

He made a slight grunting noise, pursing his lips together.“Not so loud!They’re going to find me, and I don’t want anyone else to get hurt.”He attempted to focus on her once more.“So you maintain mechs now?You don’t design anymore?”

Joy sighed and took more than a little sip of her drink.“No one else will touch my mechs, Bruce.They’re a little afraid of them.I mean, they’re just regular mechs, not synths, but…” Joy shrugged.“I guess I made them a little too well.”She sat on the barstool, her arms at her sides.“So I just stopped.It wasn’t fun anymore, and besides, I had grandchildren to dote on.”

“How many?” Maddox asked.

“Two,” she said.“Jenna and Wynn.You?”

Maddox scoffed.“I have a couple of girls.”

“And it looks like it’s gonna be a while before my oldest, Theodred, is gonna settle, so you gotta be grateful for what you have.”

“You and your husband must spoil them, huh?” Maddox said.

Now it was Joy’s turn to look down at her drink.

“Oh,” Maddox said, realizing.

“It’s been…awhile,” Joy said.“But he’s always gonna be my Cowboy.”

“Did someone say, Cowboy?”

A vision in white and fringe and a wide-brimmed hat that was impressive in its ridiculous size, The two turned around to see one of the more visible co-owners of the Starship Casino, none other than Roger Nelson Jr. himself. 

Joy knew him back when his code-name was ‘Bluegrass’.

She got up and attacked him with a hug.Before she could gush and ask him how he’d been, he spoke into her shoulder, sotto voce.

“You gotta get outta here.The Fenris Rangers gave me a heads-up that something might be going on around him and Theo wants you to bug out.”

She withdrew, the frown on her face causing a line to appear between her brows.“He couldn’t get in touch with me himself?”

“Don’t kill the messenger, Stink,” he said, invoking an ancient nickname.“He did pass along a subspace frequency for you.”

He passed a data slip to her.“Thanks,” she said.“Let him know he’s not off the hook.Not by a long shot.”With that, she went back to the bar and tapped a gratuity over to the bartender.She moved to Maddox and put a hand on his shoulder.Her heart sunk when he recoiled slightly, but told him, “Take care of yourself, Bruce.I hate to think that this it for you.”

He nodded, but said nothing.She gathered her belongings and exited the lounge, and then the casino. 

Close by, two figures in shining techno-armor looked down from an outcropping. One had red in its design, while the other was a pale cobalt-blue.

“Message recieved, Ranger,” one said, with a twang in his voice.“Did ya have to be so harsh with your own mama?”

“She can’t be part of this,” the Ranger replied.“I needed to get her back home, to safety.”

“You take care of yourself, Theo,” Bluegrass said, and ambled back into his casino. 

“It’s what I do best,” Theodred Gamling muttered to himself and exclaimed, “WING IT!” and flew off into the noisy, greasy, churned-up Freecloud night. 


End file.
